Applying For, Like, A Job, Dawg? Read This

According to the folks who are in the know about things like this, they say that it is getting tougher and harder to land a good job after graduating college. The big question is why? Of course we can't all be an extremely intelligent, witty, articulate and handsome columnist writers can we?

Having done a good deal of traveling around this country, I think I have discovered some of the problems young folks encounter when applying for a job.

Here's one basic stumbling block. Unless you are applying for work at your local tattoo parlor and piercing station, take out all of your face jewelry.

I know, it's part of your “per sauna” and you have the constitutionally-given right to deface your face with tongue studs, eyebrow studs, those silly things that make your ear lobes look like a hula hoop and a bone through your nose, but in most grown-up circles today that is socially unacceptable.

Oh, sure, your friends, similarly pierced, poked and inked will ohh and ahh as you show off your newest imbecilic purchase but the forty-something behind the desk at the human resources desk of the company at which you want to find employment will not look favorably upon your countenance.

Secondly, your opening statement upon entering the hiring person's cubicle should not, under any circumstances be “Yo, Dude.” Nor the very cool “'Sup, Dawg.”

Furthermore, you should curtail your insipid use of the word “like.” Do not try to carry on a conversation such as this – “ Like ... I really want to, like ... work at this ... like ... company. I like, graduated, like ... 45th in my ... like ... class” – if you are searching for a job in telemarketing.

Do not begin a sentence with “I mean.” You can't mean anything if you haven't said anything in the first place. And leave your cell phone off!

While “The Bachelor” is popular with the 18- to 32-year -olds, and the bachelors all appear scruffily with “scruff,” it is better to show up for a job interview cleanly shaven unless, of course, you are applying for work at Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Palace.

At this point in time you could get a job most anywhere in Seattle if you show up wearing only a Seahawk T-shirt or hoodie and sporting a full beard. But I think the better dressed you are the better chance you will have of landing the position of which you seek.

And here's a definite no-no when out drinking with your buddies. If the sheriff should happen to stroll by as you head out the saloon door, do not say to him, “Yo Officer, could you help me find my pickup? I think I'm far too drunk to walk home.”

If you are applying as a bowling alley pinsetter mechanic you could dress as you did while in college. You know, tank top, jeans with huge gaping holes in the knees and butt, and the always adorable baseball cap on backward. A hearty “Yo, Dude” might even be appropriate in this case.

And wouldn't your parents be proud when you tell them you are working at the Pike Place Fish Market tossing salmon from booth to booth, at minimum wage, after mom and dad blew $137,345.19 on your five-year college education? ($3,000 of which secretly went for tats and body piercings.)

Ahh, what the heck! What does a man who claims the best six years of his life were spent trying to graduate from high school know about anything anyhow?